Independent Game Creator and Installation Designer

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For some final touches, I removed the vinyl logo on the front of the arcade (it seemed like there was too much) and added stickers around the cabinet. I also added some EL wire to the outer lines with automotive PE Foam Tape. Really happy with how this turned out 🙂

This is an early prototype of the arcade cabinet that I’m using to test the shape while I collect the components for a larger enclosure. I’ve moved the connections from a breadboard to a prototyping shield, and can use a small display in the slot if needed.

The current plan is to design a cabinet to be laser cut, and add a strip of NeoPixels to match the player’s color. I may then add an additional servo motor or two depending on whether or not I can provide enough power to the Arduino.

I’ve also managed to get openFrameworks up and running on a raspberry pi, which will be the platform that runs the actual arcade when it’s finalized.

With the final design complete, here is a photo of the final version of the tree in the exhibition space. We added the trilby hat as a way of hinting that this belonged to two different worlds (as it was removed at one point during our final exhibition, I don’t have an image of the two together). Should I manage to locate a new one, I will update this post.

Following this post, I’ll put up a wrap-up video and summary of the build process for anyone hoping to get a quicker version of this blog 🙂

We had major issues with inconsistent readings from our touch points on the tree (where sometimes 10,7 and 3 wouldn’t register, and others 8, and 0 for example). This issue is the same as from before painting. We tried rewiring one input, but this only temporarily fixed the issue.

Following this, we realized that the only thing changing between tests was us moving the alligator clips. This led us to believe that the connections aren’t solid (the wire is very thin).

To correct this we soldered header pins to each of the contact points and then jumper wires to each. This will allow us to test by scaling things back.

Next we will connect these wires directly to the wires in the tree and test again (with the eventual goal being that we solder the wires together).

We built a coat rack that I got from Argos to use as the base of our tree and to test with our example Code on the raspberry pi. If there’s time we’ll add on to the shape somehow (by extending the branches or something) but will need to be careful not to ruin the experience. If we add on too much by making surfaces that people can’t interact with (though they would expect that they can) we’ll break the experience

I received a replacement part for the Capacitive Touch Hat and soldered it to the 2 x 20 header pins included. This time, it’s recognized on the I2C bus and we should be able to continue further tomorrow.